The Comparative Religion concentration encourages the joint study of different religious traditions by exploring their fundamental themes, beliefs, and concerns, their principal figures and texts, and their variety of rituals and practices. In a socio-cultural context characterized by an increasing degree of religious pluralism, students will acquire the methodological and conceptual tools to engage in comparative studies of two or more religions from a thematic, analytic, or constructive perspective. Particular emphasis will be given to interdisciplinary approaches to the study of religion...

Students in this concentration study Jewish history, culture, and literature from antiquity until the present. Students are trained in theoretical approaches such as literary and cultural criticism as well as historical and sociological analysis. Students acquire general competence in the history of Judaism from late antiquity to the present. Resources are particularly strong for study in rabbinics, medieval Jewish history, Jewish-Christian interactions, and Eastern European Jewish literature and culture. Students may focus on themes such as language, translation, secularization, gender, and...

An institution of higher learning unlike any other, the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley brings together scholars of the world’s diverse religions and wisdom traditions to advance new knowledge, share inspiration, and collaborate on solutions.